Saturday, September 5, 2015

I can't tell you how many times I've
had clients say to me, “I've been telling everyone all about you.”
Or “I've told so and so he needs to come and see you but he just
won't do it”.

Like anything else when we become
excited about something that really works for us, its hard not to
tell the world about it and expect everyone else to be as excited
about that “thing” as we are. For many of us massage junkies,
it's difficult to understand how someone would NOT like to get a
massage.

So I have compiled a few ideas to think
about the next time you are trying to “convert” your friends and
colleagues to the wonderful world of massage therapy

The first thing to consider is that not
everyone likes to be touched. Period. We live in a society where many
people often grow up with really bad boundaries. People who been
survivors of domestic violence, battery or sexual abuse, have a very
difficult time with tactile stimulation because they've learned touch
is not safe. If those individuals have never experienced a massage
before, they have added anxiety about the idea of removing their
clothes because they do not know what to expect from a massage
session. Complicate that even more, with the stigma of “massage
parlors”, that is massage services that covertly adverstise adult
entertainment, prostitution services or “happy endings” or worse
yet, human trafficking, and some people have a recipe for some very
severe anxiety at the prospect of getting a massage at all,
especially if they have been exposed to any bad publicity. If you
open up a phone book in Southern California and look up massage you
are immediately accosted by listing after listing of “XXX massage”
ads.

One thing to keep in mind when
referring your friends or associates, is that you don't always know
what someone has been through. Consider for a moment, statistically
one out of every three women in a room has been the victim of sexual
abuse or rape. Take a look around your office or the coffee shop you
are sitting in and do the math. That's a lot of women. And most of
them have never said a word to anyone and you'd never know it to look
at them. I imagine the statistics have probably gone up in the last
decade. That quiet woman in your office building, that you think
needs a relaxing day at the spa, may have more in her closet then you
could possibly know about. There may be a good reason you are not
getting the response that you would have hoped when you make your
recommendation to her.

The second thing to consider is
regarding men. Men seem to have a more difficult time in many cases
trying a massage session for the first time because men are usually a
lot more aware of the “parlor” industry then women are for
starters. Either they have already tried those sexual services, OR,
they may believe that massage is ONLY about parlor services because
of the bad publicity they have been exposed to or may have been told
about by other men. Additionally not knowing what to expect can
feed the anxiety. Men also have the added concern of getting
erections during a session especially if they don't get touched a lot
at home. This can lead to many emotionally charged complications
for a man on the table. He may feel ashamed that he can't control
his response, he may be concerned the therapist will think badly of
him or think he is a pervert, or he may feel like he is betraying his
wife. Men who are relaxed and trusting in their massage sessions
hardly ever have this problem, but men who have not had any previous
experience of massage therapy may have to go through a learning curve
about how they will physically respond to it at first especially if
they have anxiety going into it.

You'd be surprised how many men there
are that really don't want any other woman touching them but their
wife. These are the kind of men that might need some additional
reassurance from their wives that it is OK for them to seek massage
treatment without being worried about offending their significant
others. They may like the idea of getting a massage, but a sense of
marital taboo, or anxiety about what to expect prevents them from
making that call. It's important to be sensitive to these issues,
because you can't force anyone to make the call no matter how badly
their back is hurting. If these deeper taboo issues are fixed in the
subconscious mind, they will have to be addressed in a way that can
put the potential client at ease before they are willing to make the
leap for a treatment session.

I recall a male client of mine who
politely asked me to remove his name from my mailing list because he
didn't want his wife knowing he was coming to see me. I was treating
him for legitimate back pain, obviously I did not provide “illicit”
services. He wasn't the one with the hang up about massage, his wife
was. He felt that his wife's jealousy would cause more problems at
home then he wanted to deal with if she found out, so he simply
didn't tell her and he didn't want my newsletters in the mail. She
didn't want any other woman “putting her hands on him”.

For those men who might be afraid of
the wrath of their wives, my suggestion would be to buy your wife a
gift certificate for a massage before you get a massage yourself.
Have her come and see me (or whoever) first, before you make your
appointment, that way she knows exactly what to expect from the
therapist in the treatment room both for herself and more importantly
for her husband. Then after her massage, consider taking her out for
date night and buying her some flowers. It might go a long way
toward re-framing her own idea of what getting a massage is all
about, in a professional and clinically boundaried environment. If
she feels she can be a participant in the pleasure of it with you,
you might dissolve any potential jealousy issues or other
insecurities that might come up around the issue. You have the
potential to encourage trust because you are not hiding something,
and you are also including her as a vital part of your pleasure
experience. Your letting her know you are a team and that in her own
personal experience the massage therapist is not the “other woman”
and it is needless to feel the therapist is a threat. The added
bonus is that with just a few considerations of this nature you might
improve your relationship significantly and also make an investment
in enhancing your intimacy and sex life. “Couples Massage” is a
very trending thing now in many day spas. Couples can sign up to get
a massage together in the same room at the same time with two
therapists in the room working on each of you simultaneously.

Marital problems aside, at a
subconscious level for “alpha” males, it can be disconcerting to
find themselves in a physically “submissive” position,
horizonal, and unclothed on a table. These are the kind of guys
that I will usually never see on my table until they are “dead or
dying”, meaning they have injured themselves so badly they are
willing to try anything at that point regardless of their hang ups.
Sometimes after that crisis experience they become believers and
decide to keep coming back. Then they look back and regret waiting
so long, now that they have come to understand the benefits of what I
do. Sometimes, I don't see them again until they are dead or dying
once again a year or two later after that tree falls on them or they
ran their motorcycle off the side of the mountain.

For those of you who do not know what
to expect, don't be afraid to ask questions or even ask if you can
come and see the treatment room before you decide if you want an
appointment or not. If you have doubts or concerns about what the
protocols of treatment are, then discuss them with your therapist or
spa manager before you make your appointment.

Many professional massage therapists
are well versed in dealing with traumatic injuries, and also dealing
with and facilitating emotional experiences for their clients during
their massage treatments.

In the ten years I've been doing this
for a living, I've seen a number of different scenarios and heard
more stories then you can possibly imagine. So for those of us who
have been doing this for a while, we are pretty good at navigating
around any concerns you may have as a potential client where it
regards your own physical and emotional experience of the massage
session.

I have worked on sexual abuse
survivors, victims of violent crimes, women who have been beaten and
choked by their ex husbands, and others who have had negative
experiences in institutional settings such as having their arms and
legs tied or strapped to a bed and put in restraints. I have worked
on clients who have experienced long term religious indoctrination
about being body shamed, or abused. I have also worked on war
veterans with PTSD. I have treated patients who were still in shock
a few days after traumatic car accidents and who were experiencing
severe pain. These are the kind of clients who have a very difficult
time being touched for a number of different reasons, and who need to
re-learn at a somatic level, the experience of safety and boundaries
with touch therapy.

Massage should be a safe and
pleasurable experience for everyone concerned. We can all do our part
by making sure it stays that way and by simply showing a little
sensitivity and curiosity as to what the resistance to the experience
might be exactly. If you have some idea of what the resistance might
be when you make a recommendation to a friend, you can be armed with
a few strategic commentaries. Speaking for myself, you can tell them
that it is perfectly acceptable for them to discuss their concerns
with the therapist you are referring them to. They should know they
are in control at all times, and they may stop the session at any
time of their own discretion. For those with modesty issues, proper
“draping” with the sheets even though you are unclothed, will be
observed at all times during the session, the client will never be
inappropriately exposed. For those who are really uncomfortable with
the idea of undressing for the session, the removal of clothing is
always optional, though it is easier without it. You can also refer
your friend or co-worker to this blog article to hear it straight
from me. Sometimes it takes one, two or three sessions to really
educate a client to be comfortable and trusting, and once they do
“get it”, they usually don't ever look back.

V.I.T.R.I.O.L.

Visit the interior parts of the earth, by rectification thou shalt find the hidden stone

Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Go to Persephone's Place Facebook Page for your chance to win this lovely pair of earrings.
All you have to do is "like" and "share" the post with this photograph to enter the drawing. The drawing will be held on the Full Moon. The winner will be announced on the Facebook Page, and also private messaged.

It's nearing the dark side of the year and I'm making room for new inventory. This next full moon could be your lucky day to win a set of these limited edition earrings.

Blessed Be
Monique

V.I.T.R.I.O.L.
Visit the interior parts of the earth, by rectification thou shalt find the hidden stone

Friday, September 7, 2012

The following is an article I found on face book that I decided to copy and share here due to it's highly interesting content.

The human energy field.

"It has long been known that activities of cells and tissues generate electrical fields that can be detected on the skin surface. But the laws of physics demand that any electrical current generates a corresponding magnetic field in the surrounding space. Since these fields were too tiny to detect, biologists assumed they could have no physiological significance.

This picture began to change in 1963. Gerhard Baule and Richard McFee of the Department of Electrical Engineering, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY detected the biomagnetic field projected from the human heart. They used two coils, each with 2 million turns of wire, connected to a sensitive amplifier.

In 1970, David Cohen of MIT, using a SQUID magnetometer, confirmed the heart measurements. By 1972, Cohen had improved the sensitivity of his instrument, enabling him to measure magnetic fields around the head produced by brain activities.

Subsequently, it has been discovered that all tissues and organs produce specific magnetic pulsations, which have come to be known as biomagnetic fields. The traditional electrical recordings, such as the electrocardiogram and electroencephalogram, are now being complemented by biomagnetic recordings, called magnetocardiograms and magnetoencephalograms. For various reasons, mapping the magnetic fields in the space around the body often provides a more accurate indication of physiology and pathology than traditional electrical measurements. Pathology alters the biomagnetic field

In the 1920’s and 1930’s, a distinguished researcher at Yale University School of Medicine, Harold Saxon Burr, suggested that diseases could be detected in the energy field of the body before physical symptoms appear. Moreover, Burr was convinced that diseases could be prevented by altering the energy field.

These concepts were ahead of their time, but are now being confirmed in medical research laboratories around the world. Scientists are using SQUID instruments to map the ways diseases alter biomagnetic fields around the body. Others are applying pulsating magnetic fields to stimulate healing. Again, sensitive individuals have been describing these phenomena for a long time, but there was no logical explanation of how it could happen.

Projection of energy from the hands of healers.

In the early 1980’s, Dr. John Zimmerman began a series of important studies on therapeutic touch, using a SQUID magnetometer at the University of Colorado School of Medicine in Denver. Zimmerman discovered that a huge pulsating biomagnetic field emanated from the hands of a TT practitioner. The frequency of the pulsations is not steady, but "sweeps" up and down, from 0.3 to 30 Hz (cycles per second), with most of the activity in the range of 7-8 Hz (Figure 2). The biomagnetic pulsations from the hands are in the same frequency range as brain waves and scientific studies of the frequencies necessary for healing indicate that they naturally sweep back and forth throughthe full range of therapeutic frequencies, thus being able to stimulate healing in any part of the body.

Confirmation of Zimmerman’s findings came in 1992, when Seto and colleagues, in Japan, studied practitioners of various martial arts and other healing methods. The "Qi emission" from the hands is so strong that they can be detected with a simple magnetometer consisting of two coils, of 80,000 turns of wire. Since then, a number of studies of QiGong practitioners have extended these investigations to the sound, light, and thermal fields emitted by healers. What is particularly interesting is that the pulsation frequency varies from moment to moment. Moreover, medical researchers developing pulsating magnetic field therapies are finding that these same frequencies are effective for ‘ jump starting’ healing in a variety of soft and hard tissues, even in patients unhealed for as long as 40 years. Specific frequencies stimulate the growth of nerves, bones, skin, capillaries, and ligaments. Of course Reiki practitioners and their patients have daily experiences of the healing process being "jump started," and academic medicine is now beginning to accept this therapy as logical and beneficial because of these new scientific findings. In Figure 2 we have bracketed portions of the signal that correspond to the frequencies used in medical devices that stimulate the healing of particular tissues. Individual differences in energy projection and detection.

To study the projection of energy from the hands of therapists, scientists must first recognize that there are huge individual differences between people. Repeated practice of various techniques can enhance the effect. There are logical neurophysiological and biophysical explanations for the roles of practice and intention. [Editors note: It would be interesting to use these detection techniques to measure the effect of a Reiki attunement on the strength and frequency of biomagnetic energies coming from the hands and also to measure how theraputic frequencies may change when treating various conditions in the body.]

It is not widely understood that "brain waves" are not confined to the brain, but actually spread throughout the body via the perineural system, the connective tissue sheathes surrounding all of the nerves. Dr. Robert O. Becker has described how this system, more than any other, regulates injury repair processes throughout the body. Hence the entire nervous system acts as an "antenna" for projecting the biomagnetic pulsations that begin in the brain, specifically in the thalamus.

Moreover, waves that begin as relatively weak pulsations in the brain appear to gather strength as they flow along the peripheral nerves and into the hands. The mechanism of this amplification probably involves the perineural system and the other connective tissue systems, such as the fascia that are intimately associated with it.

Conclusion In this brief summary, I have shown how some of the experiences of energy therapists have a basis in biology and physics. After centuries of neglect, energetic therapies can take their appropriate place in clinical medicine. The great discoveries of biologists and of sensitive bodyworkers are being integrated to give us a deeper understanding of life, disease, and healing. Science cannot take away the ultimate mystery of life, nor can it detract from the spiritual componet of healing. We believe that research on the energy therapies can lead to much a more complete understanding of life, desease, and healing."

References:

(1) SQUID is an acronym for Superconducting Quantum Interference Device.

Jim and Nora Oschman are directors of Nature’s Own Research Association in Dover, New Hampshire. Jim is one of the few academic scientists who has focused on the scientific basis for various complementary or alternative medicines. Jim and Nora have written dozens of articles describing the physiological and biophysical mechanisms involved in a wide variety of therapeutic approaches.

V.I.T.R.I.O.L.
Visit the interior parts of the earth, by rectification thou shalt find the hidden stone